Thursday, May 03, 2012

Debate on Presidential Debate Riles Mexico

MEXICO CITY—Some of Mexico's presidential candidates cried foul on Wednesday after the country's second-largest broadcaster said it would air a soccer game instead of the first presidential debate on Sunday.

The decision this week by broadcaster TV Azteca SAB has sparked a brawl involving the candidates, the country's political parties and electoral authority, pundits, its soccer league and sports fans.

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The move led to accusations that TV Azteca, and its billionaire owner Ricardo Salinas Pliego, is protecting front-runner Enrique Peña Nieto, the candidate of the Institutional Revolutionary Party, Mexico's former ruling party.

Mr. Peña Nieto enjoys a 20-point lead in most polls over his nearest rival, and has by far the most to lose by a bad debate performance. With the election only two months away, his rivals hope a debate stumble could slow his momentum.

"If the debate is not broadcast on open television, it's going to be obvious that the networks want to impose the next president of Mexico," said Andrés Manuel López Obrador, the candidate of the leftist Party of the Democratic Revolution, whom polls put in third place.

Mr. López Obrador, who narrowly lost the 2006 election, called on Mexico's election agency to force broadcasters to carry the debate. The agency said it was considering such a move.

The debate over the debate underlines the continuing influence that the country's television duopoly, made up of TV Azteca and No. 1 broadcaster Grupo Televisa SAB, exerts on its politics. TV Azteca, controlled by Mr. Salinas, has about 30% of Mexico's open television market, while rival Televisa controls the rest.

The two broadcasters have long been among the country's most important power brokers, trading access to the airwaves in exchange for protecting their business interests.

Some analysts say that both Azteca and Televisa want to help elect Mr. Peña Nieto in exchange for protecting their duopoly by ensuring that no other firm can build a viable third or fourth broadcaster. In the past, both companies have acted to block new entrants, according to rival media companies and analysts.

Azteca had no immediate comment on Wednesday, but in the past it has rejected any accusations it has tried to cut deals to protect its business interests. Mr. Peña Nieto's campaign has also rejected any such quid pro quo.

For its part, Televisa is broadcasting the debate, but not on its flagship channel, where it is airing a popular variety show. It has aired past presidential debates on its secondary channels. A Televisa official said on Wednesday the company covered all presidential candidates fairly, and said there was no evidence to "sustain the hypothesis" that it favored Mr. Peña Nieto.

The ties between the TV firms and the PRI run deep. Televisa's late founder, Emilio Azcarraga Milmo, famously called himself a "soldier of the PRI." The telegenic Mr. Peña Nieto is married to a former top Televisa soap-opera star. And both companies have had top executives serve as PRI senators or deputies.

Jorge Chabat, a political analyst at the CIDE, a Mexican graduate school, said the broadcasters appeared to have a political motive. "I fear…there is a clear intention to protect Peña Nieto," he wrote in Animal Politico, a Mexican political website.

TV Azteca says it can choose what to air. "If you want a debate, see it on Televisa, if not, see the soccer on Azteca. I'll send you the ratings the day after," Mr. Salinas wrote on his Twitter account Monday, setting off the controversy.

In the U.S., networks are expected to air presidential debates. In 2000, NBC and Fox networks were criticized by the U.S. Federal Communications Commission for failing to air the first of two presidential debates. Both networks have since aired all of the debates.

"This is a mockery of Mexico's fragile democracy and an arrogant message to the people of 'give them bread and circuses,'" wrote Enrique Krause, a leading Mexican intellectual and historian.

Josefina Vázquez Mota, the candidate for the conservative ruling National Action Party, implored fans to watch the debate. "What's in play is very important," she said in an interview.

Mr. Peña Nieto said he was ready to debate but said it was up to the election agency to make sure it was widely broadcast. A PRI party official said it would be undemocratic to force broadcasters to carry the debate.

The Anonymous group of computer hackers said it disabled various websites belonging to Mr. Salinas' business empire in response to the decision to air the soccer game.

Mr. Salinas, widely considered to be the brash bad boy of Mexico's billionaires for his many run-ins with the country's regulatory authorities, has had a running battle with the Federal Elections Institute, or IFE, as Mexico's electoral authority is known, since 2007. That year reforms decreed that broadcasters could not charge for televised ads by candidates, increased the number of free spots, and fixed the times that they had to run, including prime time.

Since then, TV Azteca has been fined millions of dollars by the IFE. A TV Azteca spokesman declined to comment.

The day and time of the presidential debate, one of just two such debates scheduled before the July election, was set nine days ago. The timing of the broadcast of the game was set on Monday after discussions between soccer officials and TV Azteca, which owns the Monarcas, one of the two teams which are facing off Sunday at the time of the debate.

Analysts and rival parties to the PRI say the timing of the game and its broadcast was aimed at sabotaging the debate's ratings. For starters, the vast majority of Mexican soccer league games are scheduled in the afternoon on Sundays. Officials from the PAN said the late start of the game, 8 p.m., has taken place fewer than 15 times since 1996.

Monarcas team officials say that no other slot was open, given the intense heat of Morelia, Michoacan, where the match will be played.

"We are talking about a democracy," said a Monarcas official, who asked not to be named. "Let each person decide whether they want to see the debate or the soccer game."

Mexico's soccer federation didn't respond to emails and telephone calls requesting comment.

Mr. Salinas' message instantly attracted a multitude of negative reactions on social networks, making him a trending topic, and generating a storm of editorial cartoons and columns.

Undeterred, Mr. Salinas answered critics with another Twitter message on Tuesday. "This is a real debate! Between a group of authoritarian twitterers and citizens free to vote for what they want to see."

A spokesman for TV Azteca said that aside from Mr. Salinas' tweets, the broadcaster had no comment.

Taken From WSJ

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